Here’s two very different sayings about the future. The first makes the case for effective prediction as something like blunt force trauma:

Any useful idea about the future should appear to be ridiculous. — Jim Dators

I always hope that the ideas I offer about the future will have that sort of cataclysmic, zen-enlightenment, lightning clap of emotive force, but the reality is that a lot of the future turns out to be a sequel to the echoing kabooms of the past. And so I find this seemingly circumscript but deeply enigmatic statement just as compelling: